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THE GROLIER CLUB 
47 EAST 6OTH STREET 
NEW YORK 


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JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 
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EXHIBITION 
FROM JANUARY 25 TO MARCH 3 
1923 
THE GROLIER CLUB 
47 EAST OOTH STREET 
NEW YORK 


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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 


No one could write about Japanese Prints without 
being under direct and constant obligation to Mr. 
Frederick W. Gookin, who has made a long and 
special study of the subject—particularly of the actor 
prints. The compiler of this catalogue has had not 
only the advantage of Mr. Gookin’s published writ- 
ings but of years of friendly correspondence and con- 
versation as well. 

To another friend, Mr. Kihachiro Matsuki of 
Kamakura, student of prints, lover and preserver 
of the poetry and legend of his land, almost equal 
obligation should be acknowledged. During happy 
hours passed with Mr. Matsuki such insight as an 
occidental may have into the meaning of prints was 
gained, with some knowledge of the quaint lore and 
romantic story that form their obvious background 
to a Japanese. 


PRELIMINARY NOTE 


By the middle of the seventeenth Century, when 
the ancient feudal wars of Japan had become legends 
and the country had been long at peace, the prosper- 
ous middle classes of the capital and, to a certain ex- 
tent, of the whole Empire had begun to demand self- 
expression in art. They were comparatively rich, 
they felt secure, they were light-hearted, bent upon 
pleasure. Poetry they had, and the minor arts; but 
painting, sculpture and the theatre were in the ser- 
vice of the Buddhist church or of the nobles—a: 
condition not to be tolerated by a nation which, it 
may be claimed, was more keen in its esthetic 
appreciation than any other that had been in the 
world since Athens fell,—when once the great body 
of the people had become rich enough, settled enough 
to get what it wanted. From the earlier marionette 
shows a popular theatre was developed that became — 
the national passion; a popular school of painting ~ 
sprang into being, gathering to itself and expanding 
certain phases of earlier Japanese art; and this school, 
disregarding the canons of classical painting, un- 
mindful of the Buddhist spiritualities, or treating 
them with scant reverence, concerned itself solely 
with the glamor of daily existence, the joy of life, the 
beauty of the present world. The chosen medium 


Vil 


PRELIMINARY NOTE 


of this school was the color print. Prints were 
made cheaply and sold by thousands. They served 
the purpose of our Sunday Supplements. They de- 
picted the popular actors in favorite réles, the famous 
courtesans—a class of women who appear to have 
been often of exquisite cultivation; much hke the 
Greek heterz. They were used as fashion plates; the 
country gentlemen who were obliged by law to come 
up to the capital once a year, the merchants who 
came in from outlying districts, took them home to 
show the people in their native villages the styles of 
the hour, the gay life of the city. They were the 
“Vogue” and ‘‘Theatre Magazine”’ of their time; 
but they were as well marvels of line and color, 
marvels of technical achievement, so filled with a 
sense of the joy and beauty of life, preserving with 
such passionate intensity, such sensitive appreciation 
each ephemeral loveliness, that they have won a 
place apart in the art of the world and in the affec- 
tions of those who are familiar with them. 

It is not for a catalogue to discuss the influence of 
Japanese prints on modern European painting, or to 
point out wherein they resemble, or differ from, the 
earlier art of the west. It is necessary, however, to 
outline briefly, as they are reached, the stages of 
technical development. The details of the process 
have been described in many books. 

Whenever a reproduction of the actual print ex- 
hibited has been published, the reference is given, 
Whenever other impressions of the prints shown have 
been reproduced, the effort has been made to refer to 
the most important or most easily accessible book or 


Vill 


PRELIMINARY NOTE 


catalogue in which the subject appears—the series 
of Vignier-Inada Catalogues, published in Paris, 
being taken always as the standard. When there is 
no reference to a reproduction of a print or subject 
it may be inferred that none has been found. 

Sizes are given in inches. 


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CATALOGUE 


CATALOGUE 
INK-PRINTS 


All Japanese prints are from wood blocks and in 
the earlier ones exhibited, which are known as 
sumi-ye, or ink prints, one block alone was used— 
black outlines being printed on white paper to make 
the picture. Later, in the so-called ‘‘ Brocade Pic- 
tures” of many colors, a separate block was cut for 
each, so that the black outline impression from what 
had come to be known as the key block, sometimes 
received impressions from more than twenty-five 
other blocks before the finished print was obtained. 


1 MORONOBU (1625-1695) 
A samurai and his sweetheart seated. Another 
woman at the right, at the left a burning candle 
in a tall stand. On the floor is a writing box 
with brushes, and beside it is an erotic poem by 
Narahira, a celebrity of the 9th Century, who is 
as famous for his intrigues as for his verses. This 
print is an excellent example of Moronobu’s 
power, but it does not show the equally charac- 
teristic archness and humor which are apparent 
in many of his faces—particularly in those of the 
Kioto set. It is unsigned, as is usual with 


3 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER’ CLUB 


Moronobu, and undated; but as the pattern of 
the woman’s obi, or sash, and the style of hair 
arrangement reappear in the prints by the same 
artist that are reproduced in the Vignier-Inada 
Catalogue, Vol. 1, No. 10, and the catalogue of the 
Field Collection, No. 12, it is likely that the three 
prints were made in the same year—perhaps 
about 1680. Fashions changed quickly in Yedo 
in those gay days and it was de rigeur for the 
courtesans, actors, and prosperous, pleasure loy- 
ing people of the middle class, who are shown in 
_ the prints, to follow them closely. 

Kurth reproduces part of this subject, spoiling 
the composition, in his “‘Japanische Holzschnitt,” 
Plate 6. The unidentified mon, or crest, of the 
lover appears in another print by Moronobu, 
which is reproduced in the French edition of 
Von Seidlitz, Plate 5. 

Size 10% X 15%. 


OKUMURA MASANOBU (Ca. 1685-1768) 

An example of Japanese wit, showing with what 
irreverent levity the public, for whom prints were 
designed, treated the solemn legends of old China. 
Incidentally it gives an excellent illustration of 
how much is lost by those who consider merely 
the decorative value of Japanese prints—their 
composition, line and color—without attempting 
to discover the meaning. It is the over-tones 
that we miss, just as a Japanese, who was not 
sufficiently conversant with western thought, 
might see only line in a Daumier cartoon or a 


4 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


Descent from the Cross. The difficulty, however, 
of finding the ultimate, central meaning or even 
the connotations of almost any work of Japanese 
or Chinese art is immense, if not insuperable, for 
everything is stated indirectly, by implication or 
through hidden meanings, the artist being able to 
rely upon the quickness of perception of the spec- 
tator and his accumulation of traditional learning. 
Fortunately the allusion in this print is clear. 
Generations of Japanese children had been nursed 
on the typically Chinese story of a noble hermit 
sage whose solitary contemplation had been in- 
terrupted by a verbal message asking him to 
come back into the world of men and be Emperor. 
When the messenger had departed the incorrup- 
tible one was found by his servant seated beside 
a waterfall busily washing from his ears the taint 
of what they had heard; and the tale of worldly 
temptation so shocked the servant that he led 
back an ox he had been about to water, refusing 
to let the beast drink of the polluted stream. 
It is a Chinese Sunday School story with an 
irreproachable Roman moral, but what do the 
Japanese—the Greeks of Asia—do with it? 
The print shows a gentleman, who is not a hermit, 
washing his ear, while a somewhat gay lady leads 
away her pet cat. Behind them, for sufficient 
caption, is depicted a classical painting of a 
waterfall drawn in the Chinese manner. 

The print is signed and sealed by Okumura 
Masanobu, and was published by Kikuya about 


17D5: 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


Reproduced, Catalogue of Field Collection, No. 


37- 
Size 113 x 164. 


HASEGAWA MITSUNOBU (Worked from 
about 1720 to about 1755) 

Two women in a room opening on a verandah. 
One, with toilet articles beside her, is arranging 
her hair before a low mirror, the other stands 
holding a box of face powder. 

The massiveness of design and the bold brush 
strokes of Moronobu have yielded to the stately 
grace of such figures as these. Inthe work of the 
contemporary Sukenobu the grace has become 
sweetness and the stateliness is gone. 

Hasegawa Mitsunobu was a painter whose few 
prints are excessively rare. He appears to have 
been born in Osaka and to have come later to 
Yedo. Books are recorded that were illustrated 
by him and were published from 1724 to 1754. 
He sometimes signed his work Baioken Eishun, 
or Shosuiken or Ryusuiken. The print exhibited 
probably appeared before 1735 and is the seventh 
sheet of a set of nine, four of which are in New 
York, the last being signed Ryusuiken Hasegawa 
Mitsunobu. 

No prints by this artist appear to have been re- 
produced. . 

Size 10% X 15. 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


PRINTS COLORED BY HAND 


Almost from the beginning some impressions of 
the black and white ink prints had been colored by 
hand; but as the art of printing developed and prints 
became popular, hand coloring became the rule 
rather than the exception, and was done much more 
carefully, either by the artist himself or under his 
direction. At first a dull orange, called tan, was 
the only pigment applied, but soon other colors 
were added, the total effect frequently being height- 
ened by the use of gold powder and black lac- 
quer. 


4 KIYOMASU (?-1764) 

Monaka reading. A Tan-ye or print colored by 
hand with dull orange. A greenish yellow has 
been used in other parts of the design. 

Monaka, a famous public beauty of her time, 
whose name and address are given, stands in her 
gorgeous robes reading a poem, only the essential 
part of which is visible to us: 


“Life is full of trouble, but the plum- 
blossoms by the window... . 


The poem, and indeed the whole print, is signifi- 
cant of the extent to which the gentle aesthet- 
icism and delicate appreciation of nature that 
had come through the influence of Zen Buddhism 
had influenced even the lower classes. The 
nobles had paintings done in India ink in which 


7 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


the spiritual significance of the subject—the qual- 
ity in it that was eternal—was indicated by a 
few brush-strokes; the people had prints like 
this. 

The tying of the obi, or sash, in front indicates 
the station of the wearer, but these women were 
creatures of exquisite culture, trained in all the 
amenities of life, and, while marriage with one of 
them was apt to lead to a double suicide, they 
were not looked down upon as they have been at 
other times and in other lands. Comparison 
with Athens is again inevitable. 

There is a peculiar stateliness about this design, 
a bigness in a small space, that is somewhat 
unusual. The print was published by Yamakichi 
probably about 1715, and is attributed with con- 
siderable confidence to the young Kiyomasu, 
though certain critics have tended to consider it 
the work of Moroshige, or the first Kiyonobu, or 
some member of the Kwaigetsudo group. It 
has been reproduced in color as the frontispiece 
of the 1922 edition of ‘“The Book of Tea.” 

Size 123 x 6. 


KONDO KIYOHARU (worked Ca. 1715-1735) 
A Buddhist nun, or possibly the actor Sanjo 
Kantaro in the réle of a Buddhist nun, carrying 
a box. The large shade hat is sprinkled with 
gold powder. 

This print was probably issued about 1718. It 
is unsigned but is attributed to Kondo Kiyoharu 
because of certain characteristics of drawing 


8 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


which seem to distinguish his work from that of 
the equally rare artist, Kondo Katsunobu, to 
whom otherwise the attribution might be made. 
Formerly in the Jaekel Collection, this print was 
reproduced in color by Munsterberg, Vol. III, 
p. 318. 

Size 12i x 53. 


KIYONOBU First (1664-1729) 

The actor, Ichikawa Monosuke the first, in the 
role of an exhibitor of trained monkeys. 

The names of actors went on from generation to 
generation, being given to adopted sons when 
there were no descendants capable of bearing 
them with sufficient distinction. In some cases 
the new bearer of a name that had lapsed was 
chosen by vote of his peers, and actors changed 
their names and identifying mon, or crests, with 
bewildering frequency. Sometimes it is only by 
the surprisingly exact portraiture that came into 
vogue with the actor prints of a slightly later 
date that it is possible to tell which generation is 
depicted. 

This print, which is unusually fine in line and 
color, as well as in condition, must have appeared 
between 1719, when the first Monosuke adopted 
the mon shown, and 1729 when he, as well as the 
artist, died. There is no dispute as to the attri- 
bution. 

In this Catalogue the attempt has not always 
been made to distinguish between different 
generations of actors of the same name, the Ex- 


9 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


hibition being intended primarily for those who 
are not specialists in the subject. If these notes 
help some to understand and appreciate, 
they will have served their sole purpose. The 
human background of Japanese prints should 
be of interest to all, the erudite historical 
problems connected with them are for specialists 
alone. 

The subject is reproduced in color as Plate No. 
16 of the unfinished work by Barboutau (1914) 
which was interrupted by his death. 

Size 133 x 6. 


KITYONOBU First 

The actor Tatsuoka Hisagiku, as a woman carry- 
ing on a small stand the conventional decoration 
for a wedding ceremony, which is made up of the 
four symbols of longevity—the pine, the peach, 
the crane, the tortoise. 

On account of various scandals which culminated 
in a celebrated murder, it became the law that 
no woman should appear on the stage. In prints, 
the actors are always men; the illusion, however, 
is perfect, as, except for the artificial voice, to 
which one grows quickly accustomed, it is perfect 
in the Japanese theatre of today. When a boy 
was born in an actor’s family, his parents decided 
quickly whether he should play male or female 
parts, and his training was in accordance with 
their decision. Everything in women’s rdles is 
played differently, even to all the gestures; and 
actors trained from childhood for these parts 


10 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


achieve an astonishing grace of carefully thought 
out rhythmic motion. 

Signed Torii Kiyonobu and published by Mura- 
taya, probably about the same date as the pre- 
ceding number. 

Print reproduced in the Catalogue of the Kinbei 
Murata Sale of September, 1918. 

Size 12 x 6. 


SHIGENAGA (1697-1756) 

The actor Arashi Wakano, as a woman under an 
umbrella walking in the snow and turning to look 
at the blossoms on a gnarled tree. In Japan, 
blossoms and snow actually are seen together, 
the rose camelias are bright under the first soft 
snow of autumn, and the blooms come on the plum 
trees before winter has begun to turn toward 
spring. The curious decoration of the outer 
kimono is formed of miniature portraits of some 
of the Thirty-six Famous Poets, of whom Narahira 
(see note on No. 1.) was one. These thirty-six 
poets were a favorite subject of art, their names 
and their verses being familiar to all. 

The print is signed by Shigenaga and was pub- 
lished by Igaya about 1725. Reproduced as No. 
25 in the Catalogue of the Frederick May Col- 
lection. 

Size 13}-x 64. 


OKUMURA MASANOBU 
A man and a woman in a room watching a youth 
who is about to write. Note the position of the 


I! 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


brush and hand, so different from the Occidental 
one. Painting, which was closely akin to the 
equally prized art of calligraphy, was done in the 
same manner. In the foreground are a writing 
box with its slab of black India ink, and a smok- 
ing box with a pipe that would hold the usual 
three puffs of tobacco which are so dear to the 
Japanese. Opium smoking never was practised 
in Japan. Behind the group of people are a sake 
pot, a cup on a stand and a tray of food with 
chopsticks. The rear wall is decorated with a 
lovely snow landscape; and on the left is a poem 
of the short seventeen-syllable form, written by 
the artist, which refers to a particularly dainty 
small plum that is nicknamed, by way of humor, 
after those gigantic and grotesque guardians of 
the temple gates—called Nio, and really is a love 
poem in disguise. The allusions in the print 
are not wholly clear. ; 
Signed and sealed by Masanobu. 

Date probably a little later than that of Number 
2 by the same artist. 

The subject is reproduced in the V. I. thiatéaue, 
Vol. I. No. 141, but from an impression that 
lacks the signature and seal. 

Size 92 x 143 


TOSHINOBU (worked Ca. 1725-1742) 

A dandy of more than questionable morals out 
walking on a cold day. His umbrella, which bears 
the characters wishing long life, is sprinkled with 
gold and he is mounted on geta, or pattens, high 


12 


I 


— 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


enough to protect him from any depth of mud or 
slush. The heavy outer coat that he wears 1s dec- 
orated with the mon of various popular actors. 
The similarity in the names of many of the print 
designers is because a pupil was given, as a sort of 
diploma, when he became proficient enough, the 
right to adopt a part of his master’s studio name. 
The man who called himself as an artist, Masan- 
obu, was the teacher as well as the father of 
Toshinobu. This rule has many notable ex- 
ceptions, for there are similarities of sound that 
have nothing to do with the studio in which an 
artist received his training. 

Toshinobu appears to have died young; while his 
father, Masanobu, lived on to a ripe old age, pro- 
ducing many designs that were printed in two 
colors, and even surviving to the beginning of the 
polychrome period. 

This print probably appeared about 1725, and 
probably is an early Toshinobu showing the in- 
fluence of his father. It was formerly in the 
Jaekel Collection and was reproduced in color by 
Munsterberg, Vol. III, p. 319, who attributed 
it to Masanobu. 

Size 123 x 6. 


KIYOMASU 

A later print than Number 4, by the same artist. 
Sanjo Kantaro, as a woman arranging her hair 
before a lacquer mirror. He is in the réle of 
Yao-ya O Shichi, a grocer’s daughter, who, when 
her father’s house burned down, was sent to stay 


13 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


in a temple where she promptly fell in love with 
one of the novices. On her return home she set 
fire to the recently completed new house in the 
hope of being sent back to her lover; but was 
unfortunate enough to choose a windy day so 
that half the town burned. There was a prompt 
investigation and the lady was executed—to be- 
come thereafter a heroine of romance. 

The original creator of the part made such a 
success in it that in revivals of the play his mon— 
a sealed letter—was used by the leading actor 
with his own and eventually came to be an indi- 
cation of the réle. 

The decorations on the robe represent wooden 
clappers strung together to be hung in the wind 
and frighten birds from the rice-fields; they are 
the Japanese equivalent of our scare-crows. 
This print is known to be by Kiyomasu because 
the impression in the Vever Collection, which is 
reproduced by Von Seidlitz, French Edition, Plate 
10, bears his signature. 

Date about 1725. 

Size 122 x 53. 


TOYONOBU (1711-1785) 

The two end sheets of a triptych representing the 
“Beauties of the Three Cities,” Kioto, Osaka and 
Yedo (now called Tokio). The color effect is 
greatly heightened by the use of lacquer and gold 
powder. 

These prints were published by Maruya and are 


‘signed Nishimura Magosaburo, a signature which 


14 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


has recently been discovered to be an early one of 
the great Toyonobu, who also signed in his youth 
Shigenobu; the two earlier signatures being found 
on prints that appeared between 1730 and 1743. 
The triptych of which these are a part must have 
been printed nearer to the earlier than to the 
later of the dates given. 

Size of each sheet 123 x 6. 


EXPERIMENTS IN COLOR 
PRINTING 


Shortly after 1740, it was discovered that by the 
use of a simple device to insure perfect register, two 
color blocks could be added to the black-outline key- 
block, the sheet on which the finished print was to 
appear being pressed on each of these in turn. These 
two-color prints are called Beni-ye because beni—a 
somewhat evanescent rose—always was used, the 
other color being at first green and afterwards either 
green or blue. A little later a third block was added, 
but was not always used; and as experiments in over- 
printing were made the range of color was greatly 
increased, before the final development of full poly- 
chrome printing, about 1765. 


13 TOYONOBU 
An example of the two-color prints of an artist 
whose earlier hand-colored work is shown as 
Number 12. 
This print was issued for the revival of another 


15 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


famous play, ““The Revenge of the Soga Broth- 
ers,” a story of vendetta coming down from the 
period of the 12th Century feudal wars, that 
holds its place on the stage today. 

Japan is the only important nation in the present 
world whose legendary and heroic past lives in 
the hearts of the people, as familiar to them as 
were the legends of Troy and Thebes to the audi- 
ences for whom Aéschylus and Sophocles wrote. 
It is as though the stories of King Arthur, the 
death of Roland, the Crusades, the Wars of the 
Roses, were so vital a part of our imaginative 
outlook that we would pack the theatres, year 
after year, to see them produced. 

The Soga brothers accomplished their revenge 
and died tragically, both in early youth. The 
poem on the print reads: “‘Youthful Brothers, 
comparable only to young maples in early leaf.”’ 
For the way to identify the Soga brothers in 
prints see note under Number 48. 

Signed by Toyonobu and published by Maruko 
In 1744. 

Sizeti5-x 19h 


TOYONOBU 

Nakamura Kiyozo as a girl called Matsuyama 
(Pine mountain), and Ishimura Kamezo as an 
attendant holding her umbrella. At least the 
lower mon on the right sleeve of KiyozO appears 
to have been put in by a plug in the block, per- 
haps to replace that of an actor who died during 
the run of the play. 


16 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


Subject reproduced, Estampes appartenant a un 
Amateur de l’Etranger. Paris. Hotel Druot. 
June 14, 1909. No. 20. 

Compare Moslé Catalogue No. 1878. 

Signed and sealed by Toyonobu and published by 
Urokogataya probably between 1748 and 1750. 
Size 162 x 12. 


MASANOBU 

Nos. 2 and 9g in this exhibition show earlier 
work of the long-lived Masanobu, the first in 
black and white only, and the second hand- 
colored. Neither one compares in beauty of 
line with this two-color print, and the soft fading 
by time of its characteristic rose and green has 
given it an added charm all its own. 

The print was issued in 1750 for another revival 
of the play described under Number 11, and 
shows the fair incendiary strolling with her lover; 
while music is the food of love. The instrument 
in her hand is a samisen, or Japanese banjo, and 
his a kokyu, or three stringed fiddle. Note the 
sealed letter—a reminder once again of the 
original creator of the rdle. 

The poem on the print reads: “Here in Sacred 
Ise, where the cherry is always in bloom, we find 
our hill of happy meeting.” 

Signed and sealed by Masanobu. 

Size 16 x 114. 


KIYOHIRO (worked Ca. 1745-1758) 
Segawa Kikunojo I and II were the most famous 
and most exquisitely depicted of all actors of 


ee 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


women’s rdles. Each was the popular idol of 
his time, and the head—at least of Kikunojo I, 
must have been turned by it for here beside his 
portrait he writes a poem, signed with his per- 
sonal name—Roko, in which he says: “As a 
woman he has as many admirers as the flowers”’ 
—the admiration of flowers being, of course, a 
universal characteristic of the Japanese. Doubt- 
less the statement was true; but in our western 
world of newspapers and press agents, actors can 
blush with surprise when they hear such things 
said of them by others. Kikunojo’s mon—the 
_ fleur de lys—is the chief decoration of his cos- 
tume; there can be no mistake about who he is. 
The composition is of extreme grace and one can 
imagine with what consummate art an actor who 
wore his clothes so well and had such clothes to 
wear, would move about the stage managing the 
undulating line of the draperies. 
Print reproduced, Kinbei Murata Catalogue of 
September, 1917, No. 22. 
Signed and sealed by Kiyohiro and published by 
Yamamoto, about 1748. 
Size 15 X 7. 


17 KIYOMITSU (1735-1785) 
The actor Sanogawa Ichimatsu holding a long 
pipe and standing beside a bench on which is 
his smoking box. 
The actor is in the réle of one of the Soga brothers 
whose tragic story is outlined in the note on 
Number 13. The way to recognize the Soga 


18 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


brothers in prints is described under Number 48. 
This one is Soga no Goro. 

Signed Torii Kiyomitsu. 

Size 12% x 54. 


This and the two following prints by Kiyomitsu 
may be dated roughly between 1760 and 1770. 
Prints in two and three colors continued to be 
made for some years after the invention of 
polychrome printing. 


KIYOMITSU 
The actor Adzuma Tozo as a woman under a 
maple, carrying bird cages. 


_ Signed by Kiyomitsu and published by Nishi- 


20 


mura. 
Size 127° X 5%. 


KIYOMITSU 

The actor Yamashita Kinsaku as a woman with 
blossoms in her hair and carrying a blossoming 
branch, from which is suspended a foot-ball. 
Foot-ball in Japan was a much more stately 
game than it is with us and was played in flowing 
garments of brocade. 

Signed by Kiyomitsu. 

Size 124 x 53. 


KIYOMITSU, KIYOTSUNE (Worked Ca. 
1756-1775) and HARUNOBU (born about 1730, 
died 1770) 

“The Beauties of Three Cities,” done by three 


19 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


different artists. (For the subject compare No. 
12.) Behind the three girls are shown the three 
flowers that are associated with the cities, and 
each wears the mon of a favorite actor. Above 
each is a love poem. 

This triptych must have appeared about the 
time of the perfecting of polychrome printing by 
Harunobu, the great name of the period between 
1764 and the date of his untimely death; but as 
two of its three sheets are by artists of the pre- 
ceding period, the last of the “‘Primitives,” it 
serves very well to mark the transition between 
‘the two- and three-color prints and the real 
“Brocade Pictures,’ besides being in itself a 
thing of peculiar loveliness. 

Reproduced as No. 83 of the F. W. Hunter 
Catalogue, with the sheets arranged in the wrong 
order. 

Signed by the three artists. 

Date about 1765. 

Size 122 x. 16%. 


The period of the ‘‘Primitives” is ended. We pass 


now to the work of artists each of whom will be con- 


sidered by himself. 


HARUNOBU (born about 1730, died 1770) 
Harunobu, who disputes with two very different 
artists, Kiyonaga and Sharaku, the claim to first rank 
among the painters and print designers of the pop- 


20 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


ular school of the 18th Century, unfortunately died 
young. His work before 1764 is little known and 
of little distinction, but between that date and his 
death in 1770 he produced an immense number of 
designs that are most beautiful in themselves and, 
because of a peculiar quality that is in them, have 
endeared him to the heart of the world. He 1s the 
artist of young girlhood, the poet of youth. His fig- 
ures, untouched by sorrow, move through an earthly 
paradise, a fairyland of loveliness, the world that 
might be rather than the world that is. He has 
caught and rendered for us the evanescent charm of 
youth, he has sought to preserve, with the fresh- 
ness of the morning on it, that fleeting moment be- 
tween the opening of the bud and the fall of the 
first petal, in which alone beauty is perfect, unalloyed. 
Harunobu did not have the stateliness of Kiyonaga, 
the sardonic power of Sharaku, he turned away 
from the theatre, was, in the main, unmindful 
of the demi-monde; what he did have, he had 
supremely—his vision of the Spring-time of life and 
love. 


All of the fifteen prints by Harunobu in this Exhi- 
bition can be dated between 1764 and 1770; most 
of them were done before 1767. They have been se- 
lected with sorrow and misgiving from about seventy 
available examples, and, fortunately, it is not neces- 
sary to discuss in connection with them the vexed, 
irrelevant questions of scholarship. In the earlier 
ones the color scheme is more simple, with a delicate 
yellow predominating, 


21 


21 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


HARU NOBU 

Young lovers playing a flute. Behind them is 
a screen decorated with pine branches. The 
bamboo leaves in the decoration of the girl’s 
gown are so arranged as to give the numerals of 
the Japanese year equivalent to our 1765. This 
year was the nine hundredth anniversary of the 
entrance of Michizane—a statesman, scholar and 
artist of old—to the court of the Emperor, and a 
number of so-called calendar prints were de- 
signed toward the close of 1764 and issued at the 
beginning of the New Year as part of the popular 
celebration of the event. (See No. 117.) 

No other impression of this print appears to 
have survived. 

The seal is that of a collector. 

Size 10 x 7%. 


HARUNOBU 
A young girl as Moso. This is another calendar 
print of the same year, the numerals being found 
among the bamboo leaves. 
Moso, one of “‘The Twenty-four Paragons of 
Filial Piety’? of Chinese moralizing, went out 
barefoot in winter to search for young bamboo 
shoots, a table delicacy for which his aged mother 
craved, and was rewarded by having them sprout 
miraculously through the snow. The story, of 
course, was thoroughly familiar to the Japanese, 
but Moso is represented here by a young 
girl. 
Subject reproduced, Blanchard Catalogue, No. 7, 
22 


23 


24 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


and, from a much trimmed impression, Hayashi 
Catalogue, p. 168. 
Size 11% x 83. 


HARU NOBU 

A young girl seated in a boat under drooping 
willow branches. She wears a long court hat 
of the olden time and has beside her a small 
drum—one of the classical instruments used 
from of old. The reference is to the pleasure 
boat wherein a Shogun of a by-gone age had 
been wont to escape the cares of government 
in the company of his mistress, the beautiful 
Asazuma. A Shogun was a prime minister who 
had usurped the secular power of the Emperor 
but not the Imperial name. 

Print reproduced, V. I. Catalogue, Vol. II, No. 
72. Some of the too heavy oxidization has been 
removed. 

Size 11 x 84. 


HARUNOBU 

Two young women walking through a storm of 
snow and rain on their way to a bath house. 
One carries a towel and a bath robe. 

Bathing is one of the national passions of the 
Japanese, and in the late afternoons the streets 
are filled with people returning from the bathing 
establishments. 

Subject reproduced, Morrison Catalogue of Ex- 
hibition held by Fine Art Society of London, 
1910, No. 68, Crewdson Catalogue, No. 31, and, 


23 


25 


2 


=> 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


from a slightly trimmed impression, Frederick 
May Catalogue No. 44. 

Signed Suzuki Harunobu. 

Size 102 x 83. 


HARUNOBU 

A young girl on a verandah stands alone, against 
the black background of night, lighting with her 
lantern the white blossoms of a plum tree in early 
bloom. It has been pointed out already that the 
Japanese are devoted to flowers. When the 
different blooms are at their finest, parties go out 
by day and night to view them and the plum 
is the earliest blossom of the year—the harbinger 
of Spring. 

Print reproduced, Kinbei Murata Catalogue of 
October 1919, No. 41. 

Subject reproduced, V. I. Catalogue Vol. II. No. 
66. 

Size 123 x 83. 


HARUNOBU 

A young man and a young woman drying, over 
braziers with dome-shaped tops, floss silk that 
has been pressed into sheets. 

The perfection of technique in the cutting of the 
blocks and in the printing is extraordinary. 

This and the two following numbers are from a 
set of ‘‘Eight Indoor Views.” In their first state 
these eight prints bear the signature of Kiosen, 
who may have been an amateur engraver and 


24 


27 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


printer, and almost certainly was a patron for 
whom prints were designed—the moving spirit 
in an artist’s club or society that issued them. 
The so-called “‘second state” of which three 
examples are shown, has no signature and the 
characteristic yellow or straw color of early 
Harunobus has been supplanted by stronger 
tones. In a third state, that frequently bears 
the signature of Harunobu, the color scheme is 
still more complicated. 

The Catalogue of the Exhibition of the Japan 
Society of New York reproduces in color all three 
states of one sheet of the set. All eight, in the 
first state, are reproduced in the Moslé Catalogue, 
and in the second state—like those shown here 
—in the Harunobu Memorial Catalogue. 

Size 11% x 83. 


HARUNOBU 

A young woman reading by the light of a portable 
lamp. From the same set as the last. It has 
been said that prints in which a good deal of 
black was used and prints in which the figures 
were not displayed against a complicated back- 
ground were apt to be finer than others. This 
print, which is one of Harunobu’s most charming 
designs, illustrates the first rule and is a notable 
exception to the second. The stream, the shore 
and the maple leaves give exactly what was 
needed. 

Size 114 x 83. 


25 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


28 HARUNOBU 


29 


A young girl with open fan, followed by her maid. 
From the same set as Numbers 26 and 27, and of 
the same state. 

Size 114 x 8. 


HARUNOBU 

Stealing the Blossoms. A young girl has climbed 
up on the back of her maid to reach a tempting 
branch of plum-blossoms above a gray wall. 

In the upper classes long sleeves were the preroga- 
tive of youth, and from childhood to age they grew 
steadily shorter. Servants wore sort sleeves, as 
in this print and Number 28. Long ones would 
have interfered with their work. 

Subject reproduced V. J. Catalogue, Vol. II, No. 
115. 

Size 102 x 7. 


The nine prints by Harunobu that have been cat- 


alogued thus far can be dated with considerable con- 
fidence between New-Year’s Day of 1765 and the 
close of 1767. The six that follow, with the possible 
exception of No. 32, which may be earlier, should 
probably be ascribed to the final two and a half years 
of the artist’s life. 


30 HARUNOBU 


Young lovers beside a green bamboo fence. The 
youth is stooping over to remove a clog of snow 


26 


3 


— 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


from the gefa, or patten, of the girl. Above are 
some verses: “‘Even today snow makes the road 
well-nigh impassable, if it should storm again to- 
morrow who could expect him to come.” 
Signed Suzuki Harunobu. Probable date 1768. 
Size 113 x 83. 


HARUNOBU 

A young girl and her maid on a wind-swept beach. 
The young lady’s companion, perhaps pleading 
for a rejected lover, points to a rock against 
which the waves are beating, while above is a 
well-known classical poem by Minamoto no 
Shigeyuki, which, with due regard to the implied 
meaning understood by the Japanese, might be 
interpreted: 


My heart is like a wave 
Broken against the rock of her denial. 


There is an inference in this poem that, though 
each wave is broken, in the end the rock itself is 
worn away. 

These verses are in the thirty-one-syllable form, 
for when the Japanese wish to write a long poem 
and say a great deal they add two lines, of seven 
syllables each, to the short seventeen- syllable 
form, referred to under Number 9, the construc- 
tion being like that of a sonnet with a distinct 
break and change of thought in a specified place. 
Subject reproduced, Harunobu Memorial Cata- 
logue, No. 90; Frederick May Catalogue, No. 


27 


a 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


567 and Sotheby Catalogue of January 1911— 
An Importer of Japanese Products, No. 60. 
Signed Suzuki Harunobu. Probable date 1768. 
Size 113 x 83. 


HARUNOBU 

A young lady who received so many locas 
that she was obliged to have an ox carry them 
for her. The background of evanescent blue 
that was in many of Harunobu’s prints is here 
only partially decomposed. 

This print is described in the V. I. Catalogue 
Vol. II], No. 217 and the subject is. reproduced 
in the Kinbei Murata Catalogue of July, 1913. 
Probable date 1769. 

Size 10% x 84. 


HARUNOBU 

Young lovers walking under snow-laden willow 
branches. This is one of Harunobu’s finest 
designs, an exquisite print in every line from the 
drooping branches above to the bottom sweep of 
the moving draperies. The Japanese call it the 
“Crow and Heron,” probably because the youth 
is dressed in black, while the girl’s outer kimono 
is white with patterning in gauffrage. A later— 
less effective—state shows a black bounding line 
about the soft snow on top of the umbrella, with 
changes in the patterns of the textiles. 

The print exhibited was reproduced in color as 
the frontispiece of the Catalogue of the Exhi- 
bition given by the Japan Society of New York 
in 1911; the state with the black bounding line 


28 


34 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


and changed patterns may best be compared in 
the reproduction in the Hayashi Catalogue, p. 
110, and there is still a third, badly engraved and 
with other differences. 

Signed Suzuki Harunobu. Probable date 1760. 
Size 114 x 8}. 


and 35 HARUNOBU 

Pillar prints, representing that pair of star- 
crossed lovers, Shirai Gompachi and Komurasaki, 
each in komuso attire, and carrying the basket hat 
and flute. 

Prints of this shape were made to be hung as 
decorations on the square wooden pillars of 
Japanese houses, and having been more fre- 
quently exposed to the light, are difficult to find 
in such condition as these. The story of the 
unfortunate lovers is too long to be retold here, 
but those who desire to read a digest of it may be 
referred to Joly’s ‘“‘Legend in Japanese Art” p. 
98. A few lines, however, must be given to ex- 
plaining the word komuso. A komuso originally 
was a person of the warrior class who for some 
reason had fallen into disgrace and taken sanctu- 
ary in a monastery. When he wandered abroad 
the deep basket hat prevented recognition and 
the flute furnished a means of subsistence; be- 
sides which the civil authorities hesitated to inter- 
fere with an unidentified person who could be 
seen at a glance to have put himself under the pro- 
tection of the Church. The costume, however, 
became a convenient one—particularly the hat— 


29 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


for people who wished to escape justice or to go 
about incognito, and apparently it was used 
often by those who had much less reason than 
Gompachi for wishing to conceal their identity. 
Even today the komuso sometimes is seen, and 
no one would think of being rude enough to dis- 
cover by force the identity of a person who wished 
to remain unknown. Sometimes, in prints, a girl 
upon whom a komuso is calling will hold out a 
mirror or bowl of water to catch a reflection of 
the hidden face; but that was a woman’s trick, 
which doubtless was pardoned. 

Both prints are signed. The probable date of 
their publication is the early part of 1770, a few 
weeks before the artist’s death. 

That of Gompachi measures 28% x 5 and was re- 
produced in the Catalogue of the first Metzgar 
Sale, 1916, No. 276. It is a famous impression of 
a famous print. 

The Komurasaki measures 273 x 5. The subject 
is reproduced in the Van Caneghem Catalogue 
No. 204. 


HARUSHIGE 


Little is known of this artist save that he made 
good pictures; but much is conjectured. He may 
have been a son or pupil of Harunobu, his may be 
an early signature of Koriusai’s; and, for the con- 
fusion of critics, a talented reprobate named Shiba 
Kokan, who was a few years younger than Harunobu 
and lived much longer, left memoirs to be published 
after his death, in which he states not only that he 


30 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


was Harushige but calls particular attention to the 
fact—if fact it be—that many of the best known 
prints attributed to and even signed Harunobu had 
been made by himself, the master’s signature having 
been forged to fool the public or to make the prints 
sell. Shiba Kokan appears to have been perfectly 
capable of playing a posthumous joke on posterity 
for his own glory and our confusion; on the other 
hand he proved himself to have been an artist of 
very genuine talent whether he was working in the 
Japanese way or experimenting in European per- 
spective and copper-plate engraving after the man- 
ner of prints brought by Dutch traders to the open 
port of Nagasaki. Those who think they can tell 
Shiba Kokan Harunobus from real Harunobus claim 
that the figures in the former have longer, thinner 
necks. There are, however, prints signed Harushige 
in which the necks are more short and round than 
those in the one exhibited. 


36 HARUSHIGE 
A scene in a restaurant beside a river, two girls 
in front; through the partially open shoj1 (sliding 
paper partitions) are seen the shadows of the 
guests, one of whom has broken a hole through 
the shoji to look at the girls. The name of the 
tea-house is given at the end of the poem above, 
which relates that the girls, touched by the 
melancholy of autumn, are disinclined to help 
entertain the guests. 
Signed Harushige. 
Size 1134 x 8H. 

31 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


BUNCHO (worked Ca. 1768-1775) 


Buncho, an artist of delicate line and a great color- 
ist, stands a little apart from the men of his time; 
unrelated, individual. Mr. Ficke has developed an 
interesting romantic theory about his sensitive per- 
sonality, which may have little basis in fact but 
makes excellent reading. (Chats on Japanese 
Prints pp. 186-193.) Buncho was of. somewhat 
higher rank than most of the artists of the popular 
school, the great body of whom were distinctly of 
the lower classes for whom they worked. The red 
seal on his prints bears his family name, Mori. His 
color schemes are as different as his line from those of 
others. 


37 BUNCHO 
The comedian Arashi Otohachi wearing a farm- 
er’s hat and holding two fish by a cord. 
Portraits of comedians are somewhat rare, the 
public apparently preferring for its souvenirs, 
pictures of the tragic actors in their moments of 
tense dramatic passion. 
Subject reproduced, Sotheby Catalogue of June 
23, 1913, No. 32. 
Signed and sealed by Buncho. 
Size 112 x 53. 

38 BUNCHO 
The actor Matsumoto Koshiro III who in 1770 
became Danjuro V. A decoration of iris on his 
white under robe. 
Signed and sealed by Buncho. 
Size 124°x% 354, 

32 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


39 BUNCHO 

Iwai Hanshiro IV as Okaru in the seventh act of 
Chushingura. Note the characteristic richness 
of color and the equally characteristic distortion 
of the curiously poised, slim figure with its sweep- 
ing curve. 

This is the first of the prints exhibited that has 
to do with the most famous and popular of all 
Japanese plays, the Chushingura, or Tale of the 
47 Ronin, an excellent translation of which by 
Jukichi Inouye was published in Tokio in tort. 
Mr. Masefield has paraphrased—not very satis- 
factorily—a part of it in “‘The Faithful.”’ (See 
notes, under Numbers 60, 67, 68, 71). The play 
is so popular that it has to be revived every year 
and the difficulty of getting a place is extreme. 
The best places are near the “‘Flower Walk” 
or path raised above the pit by which the actors 
pass between the rear of the theatre and the stage 
—an arrangement made familiar to us by Rhein- 
ardt’s production of ‘“‘Sumurun.” The actors 
frequently stop for posturing in the middle of the 
Flower Walk and he whose place is near them is 
a fortunate person. The floor of a Japanese 
theatre is divided into what look like cucumber 
frames six feet square (two mats each), separated 
by two-inch railings. Into each of these frames 
four spectators get, the Japanese having an in- 
herited ability to fold themselves like pen- 
knives and remain shut for hours. Some per- 
formances of Chushingura begin at ten in the 
morning and continue until five in the afternoon, 


ae 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


when they stop abruptly with the play unfinished, 
to make room for the evening performance of 
some other piece. The compiler has seen three 
productions of parts of this play, but never yet 
has he been fortunate enough to be in at the 
death of the villain—and Moronao is the kind 
of a villain that one particularly likes to see die. 
When the company is a good one the acting is 
impressive and moving in the extreme, and 
the costumes are most effective with their 
beautiful stiff brocades in luminous folds of 
color. 

Print reproduced, Frederick May Catalogue, No. 
1125. 

Signed and sealed by Buncho. 

Size 123 X 53. 


40 BUNCHO 


as 


Chosan, a tea-house beauty, walking through a 
snow-storm with her attendants. In the upper 
corner is a letter addressed to the girl, “‘from one 
she knows.” 

Print reproduced by Ficke, Plate 22. 

Signed and sealed by Buncho. 

Size 122 x 6. 


BUNCHO 

Nakamura Kiyozo as a woman on a snowy night, 
outside a closed gate. Black background. 

An impression of the same subject, but appa- 
rently with a gray instead of a black sky, is 


34 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


reproduced, V. |. Catalogue, Vol. III, No. 
148. 

Signed and sealed by Buncho. 

Published by Nishimura. 

Size 12} x 5%. 


SHUNSHO (1726-1793) 


Katsukawa Shunsho, one of the most powerful 
and dramatic artists of the popular school, is un- 
questionably the greatest designer of actor prints— 
Sharaku, with his limited production, standing some- 
what apart. He was enormously productive; the 
Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, for example, has 
over seven hundred prints by him; but like all artists 
who did a great deal of work, his quality is variable. 
Very few prints by Shunsho are poor, most are good 
to very good, all are interesting and many are so ex- 
traordinarily fine in their dramatic power as to make 
him without a peer in his special field. Shunsho 
has a secondary importance as the teacher of Shun- 
ko and Shunyei, some of whose prints are exhibited, 
and of several other notable designers—among them 
Hokusai, whose signature on graduation from his 
master’s studio was Shunro. (See note on pupils’ 
names under No. 10.) 


42 SHUNSHO 
The actor, Bando Matataro, dressed in leather 
armor. Above him is an inscription in white 
giving a line from the play, which is of little 
interest to us but probably was spoken at the 
dramatic moment depicted. 


35 


4 


WwW 


44 


45 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB. 


Signed with Shunsho’s jar seal which appears in 
this form chiefly on prints of his early period. 
Date about 1768. 

Size 11% X 53. 


SHUNSHO 

The hero Gompachi, Harunobu’s representation 
of whom is shown as Number 34, is here repre- 
sented by the actor Ichikawa Monnosuke. Gom- 
pachi’s komuso disguise is described in the note 
on the print referred to above. 

The subject, if not the identical print, is repro- 
duced in the Tokyo volume of ‘Selected Actor 
Prints” No. 146. 

Signed Shunsho. Date 1772. 

Size 12 x 52. 


SHUNSHO 

Black background. The actor Nakamura Na- 
kazo as a Buddhist pilgrim. He carries the 
pilgrim’s staff, and on his back is a portable 
shrine. 

Signed Shunsho. Date about 1780. 

Size 12} X 5%. 


SHUNSHO 
Black background. The actor Danzo as a 
samurai holding a lantern whose flaring rays 
illuminate the dark sky. A samurai was a feudal 
retainer of the warrior class who was privileged 
to wear two swords. 
Signed Shunsho. Date uncertain. 
Size 123 x 52. 

30 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


46 SHUNSHO 
“The Red Danjuro.” The 5th Ichikawa Dan- 
juro in a shibaraku, or “wait a moment,” role. 
Between the acts, or at the close of a performance 
when the company was assembled on the stage, 
the leading actor was accustomed to run down, 
the “flower walk,” described under Number 39, 
call out “wait a moment” and perform a brief 
act of his own, to the particular delectation of 
those who had been fortunate enough to secure 
places in that part of the house. These inter- 
ludes were played with a sort of voluminous 
‘dressing-gown thrown over the costume. In 
this print the mon, or crest, on the curtains behind 
the actor is that of the Nakamura Theatre. 
The large white mon of concentric squares, so 
prominent on the costume, is that of Danjuro 
himself. 
The blue background that so often decomposes 
to dull yellow (see note on Number 32) here is 
perfectly preserved. 
Subject reproduced Selected Actor Prints No. 
104. 
Signed Shunsho. Date 1770. 
Size 122 x 53. 


47 SHUNSHO 
“The Black Danjuro.” The 5th Danjuro in 
another shibaraku role like that of Number 46; 
but this time he is wrapped in voluminous black 
on which is a great white ideograph indicating 
Kintoki, that fabulous young Hercules who grew 


af 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


up with his wild, mountain mother and performed 
such amazing feats of strength. 
The make-up of the face with red lines was an 
hereditary privilege of the Danjuros or of the 
Ichikawa actor-family to which they belonged. 
The Danjuros were the greatest of all Japanese 
tragic actors, and the 4th, 5th and oth were the 
greatest of the Danjuros. In fact since the 
death of the 9th Danjuro, about twenty years 
ago, no one has been found who was universally 
considered worthy to take the name, and the vari- 
ous aspirants continue to sigh in vain. The 4th 
- Danjuro gave the name to the 5th, who happened 
to be his son, in 1770. In this print the mon 
nowhere appears but the face is unmistakable. 
Both the 4th and 5th Danjuros had very long 
noses but the face of the 5th was a little more full, 
a little less thin, than that of his great predeces- 
sor. 
Print reproduced, ‘Selected Actor Prints,’ No. 
170. Signed Shunsho. Date 1781. 
51ze 123. x52: 


48 SHUNSHO 
The actor Ichikawa Monnosuke II as Shosho, the 
Mistress of one of the Soga brothers whose story 
is referred to in the note on Number 13. He holds 
aloft a jar of incense. The costumes of the 
Soga play are apt to be easy to identify by the » 
butterflies of one brother and the fat little chi- 
dori birds of the other; as in the print referred to 
above, where both are seen. Compare Number 17. 


38 


49 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


Subject reproduced, ‘‘ Selected Actor Prints,’”’ No. 
163. 

Signed Shunsho. Date 1776. 

Size 13 x 6. 


SHUNSHO 

The 4th Hanshiro as a woman in pink and white 
holding a round fan. 

Signed Shunsho. Date about 1780. 

Size 113 x 54. 


The dating of actor prints is one of the erudite 
subjects left undiscussed here; it may, however, 
be said briefly that the sources of knowledge are 
threefold: 

(1) With the help of the chronicles of the 
Yedo stage and after long independent researches 
Mr. Frederick W. Gookin, and Major J. J. 
O’Brien Sexton of London have succeeded in dis- 
covering the actual dates of many performances 
the actors in which are represented in prints. 

(2) In 1919 there was published in Tokyo a 
volume of “Selected Actor Prints”’ giving repro- 
ductions of 300 prints which could be dated, at 
least approximately, either through the theatri- 
cal records preserved in the actors’ families or by 
means of contemporary inscriptions. 

(3) Shortly afterwards the Ukio-ye Magazine 
of the same city reproduced over fifty variations 
of Shunsho’s signature and seals, arranged in 
approximately chronological order and taken 
from prints the dates of which were known. 


Bie 


50 


— 


5 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


With these three authorities it should be easy to 
date any print by Shunsho; but what is to be 
done when the authorities disagree? 


SHUNSHO 

The same actor as the last. A brilliant print in 
a perfect state of preservation. 

Print reproduced, Blanchard Catalogue, No. 11 B. 
Signed Shunsho. Date about 1774. 

Size 122 x 6. 


SHUNSHO 

The actor Yamashita Kinsaku as a woman. 
This is a rather unusual actor, the mon being one 
that is not often seen; but then actors changed 
their names and, by consequence, their crests, 
with an even more bewildering frequency than 
did the painters who depicted them. 

Signed Shunsho. Date about 1780. 
SIZGADPRIFE, 


SHUNSHO 

The same actor, Yamashita Kinsaku, holding a 
lute and standing on a river bank against the 
black background of night. , 

Print reproduced Frederick May Catalogue No. 
333. 

Signed Shunsho. Date 1778. 

Size 123% x 53. 


It is rather odd that although Shunsho is thought 
to be at his best in his earlier maturity, almost 


40 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


all the nine prints selected, after careful com- 
parison, for this exhibition should date from a 
later period. 


SHUNKO (worked Ca. 1770-1790) 


Except for Hokusai, who early in his career broke 
away from the manner and traditions of his master, 
the most important of Shunsho’s many pupils were 
Shunko and Shunyei. The date of Shunko’s birth 
is not known, but about 1790 he was incapacitated by 
paralysis and the remaining twenty-two years of his 
life are a blank of which one does not like to think. 


53 SHUNKO 
The 5th Danjuro, other portraits of whom are 
shown as Numbers 46 and 47. Shunsho’s print 
of this actor in the same performance is repro- 
duced in the H.E. Field Catalogue, No. 278. In 
some cases the former pupil surpassed the master, 
but Shunko is apt to have less dramatic power, 
more suavity. | 
Signed Katsukawa Shunko. Date about 1780. 
Size 12% X 53. 


54 SHUNKO 
The actor Nakamura Tomijuro as an old man. 
This is very different in line and feeling from any 
print by Shunko’s master, Shunsho, with which 
the compiler happens to be familiar, and shows 
how original the finest work of Shunko was. 
Signed Shunko. Date about 1780. 
Size 11¢ X 5¢- 

41 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


55 SHUNKO 
Another portrait of the actor Iwai Hanshiro 
(compare Numbers 49 and 50). Here he is 
dressed in black with purple obi and stands be- 
neath a snow-laden willow. 
Signed Shunko. 
Size 12 X 54. 


SHUNYEI (1768-1819) 


Shunyei, an artist of marked originality, is ranked 
by many as almost the equal of Shunsho, with whom 
he certainly compares favorably in power of charac- 
terization and individuality of treatment; though he 
seldom, if ever, shows the tragic intensity of his 
master. It would be difficult to make a mistake in 
the attribution of an unsigned Shunye; the work of 
the other men when it lacks a signature, is harder to 
place with assurance. Shunyei is closer to Sharaku. 
No attempt has been made to date separately the 
four prints by Shunyei that have been chosen for 
exhibition; it is likely, however, that all were issued 
between 1789 and the close of the century. 


56 SHUNYEI 

A portrait of the 5th Danjuro (compare Num- 
bers 46, 47, 53) on one of the rare occasions when 
he appeared as a woman—and an angry one at 
that; the actors who specialized in men’s or 
women’s réles very seldom attempting the other. 
The branch drooping into the top of the print is a 
device frequently employed by this artist. 


42 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


Signed Shunyei and published by Tsura Kieimon. 
Size 123 x 58. 


57 SHUNYEI 
Portrait of the actor Sawamura Sojuro in a pleas- 
ure boat. 
Print reproduced, Haviland Catalogue, Part 1, 
No. 174. 
Signed Shunyei. 
Size 122 x 52. ° 


58 SHUNYEI 
The same actor as the last. This time he is in 
simple white set off by an obi of purple and 
stands, without accessories, against a gray sky 
with white blossoms above. 
Signed Shunyei and published by Tsuruya. 
ize 22 xX 54. 


59 SHUNYEI 

This portrait of the sti Danjuro may be com- 
pared with those by Shunsho and Shunko which 
are exhibited as Numbers 46, 47, 53, 56, and that 
by Sharaku, Number 71. All are notable works, 
and this, with the next print by Shunyei to be 
exhibited, is counted among the finest things he 
did. 

Danjuro stands, with drawn sword and swirling 
garments decorated with sea-weed, in water that 
swirls and breaks against the closed gate of a 
dam. His long hair, marvelously engraved and 
printed, has the rhythm of the draperies. His 
legs and arms are cased in mottled frog skin, 


43 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


for he is in the part of Tenjiku Tokubei—a tra- 
veler of the 17th Century whose exploits had be- 
come legendary, and who was supposed to have 
lived among frogs and to have been able to trans- 
form himself into a gigantic one by some special 
form of magic. Tokubei, who is reported to have 
started on his first journey to India and Siam 
in 1633, is said to have been a mighty highway- 
man in his youth, but finally to have reformed and 
entered the priesthood, where it is likely that his 
parishioners—if he had any—took good care not 
to thwart him. In the print he is shown before 


~ his reformation. 


60 


Signed Shunyel. 
Size-13 x 6, 


SHUNYEI 
The actor Ichikawa Komazo as a hunter in a 
straw rain coat and carrying a gun. Heis in the 
role of the unfortunate Kanpei in Chushingura. 
(For the play see Number 39). Kanpei’s hunt- 
ing was not very successful, for his only kill that 
night was an unrecognized man, and when he got 
home in the morning to find that the body of his 
father-in-law had just been brought in, the deduc- 
tions from circumstantial evidence gave him a 
bad hour or two. This print may be Shunyei’s 
masterpiece. 
Subject reproduced, No. 176 Shojiro Nomura 
Catalogue (Sale Anderson Galleries) March 16, 
1915. 
Size 13 X 54. 

44 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


SHARAKU 


Date of birth uncertain, died 1804. He appears 
to have designed prints only inthe years 1794 and 
1795. 

Much has been written about Sharaku, most 
notably—in spite of his poetic exaggeration—by 
Mr. Ficke in his “Chats on Japanese Prints,” pp. 
300-319; much could be written, and the temptation 
is great. For the present, however, it must suffice 
to make clear, if possible, the human background 
and let the art speak for itself. The popular theatre 
was scorned—as prints were scorned—by all save 
the middle and lower classes; the aristocrats, in the 
seclusion of their palaces, had the No dramas of ex- 
ceedingly abstruse meaning and lofty moral tone that 
were danced and chanted before hushed audiences 
of scholars. Sharaku was a professional No dancer 
in the service of one of the great nobles, and he ap- 
pears in his maturity to have come suddenly and 
for the first time into contact with the theatre of the 
people. It is as though some cloistered Fellow of 
Oxford, who had given his life to playing AEschylus 
and Sophocles there, should have witnessed a series 
of amateur nights in vaudeville. He saw the com- 
monness of common men, their bestiality, their small 
conceit, their stupidity; he saw the animal charac- 
teristics in them so clearly that he would have been 
an excellent illustrator of AEsop or of Gulliver’s 
Travels—the comparison with Swift is rather apt; 
and, in spite of rays of somewhat ironic humor that 


45 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


gleam occasionally from his portraits, he drew them 
in the main with savage scorn, with that blind bit- 
terness which is the child of disillusion. He reveals 
the plebeian actors as Goya revealed the Spanish 
Bourbons—but there is this vast difference: Sharaku 
was able to let himself go, Goya was not. Portraits 
of popular idols drawn in this vein are not likely to 
prove popular; and after two years of the uninter- 
rupted production of masterpieces Sharaku ceased 
to make prints. The rest is silence. There are ru- 
mors and conjectures as to his later years but noth- 
ing very definite is known; nor is it known just how 
-many prints he designed during those two years of 
bitter activity. Herr Kurth wrote a book in Ger- 
man on Sharaku’s prints and was able to record 
about seventy and reproduce most of them, after 
which the French collectors hung 105, all of which are 
reproduced as part of one of those exhibitions at 
the Musée des Arts Decoratifs, of which the V. I. 
Catalogues are the monumental record. Of the 
eleven selected for exhibition here, all of which are 
signed Toshusai Sharaku and were published by 
Tsutaya, one is unrecorded either by Kurth or the 
Paris Catalogue. The references to Kurth are to 
the edition of 1910. 


61 SHARAKU 
Yellow ground. The actor Segawa Tomisaburo 
as a woman defending a child. 
The subject is recorded by Kurth, No. 19 (O). 
The V. I. Catalogue does not contain it. It is 
reproduced, however, as No. 14, in the advertise- 


46 


62 


63 


64 


6 


ww 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


ment of Rex & Company at the end of Kurth’s 
volume. 
Size 13 x 6. 


SHARAKU 

Yellow ground. Yamashima Tomijuro as a 
samurai holding a painted fan. 

Subject reproduced, Kurth, Plate 31. Not in 
V. I. Catalogue. 

Size 123 x 6. 


SHARAKU 

Yellow ground. Ichikawa Yaozo as a samurai 
in a black robe decorated with the so-called 
“thunder pattern.” 

Subject reproduced, V. I. Catalogue, Vol. III, 
No. 315. 

Size 122 x 54. 


SHARAKU 

Mica ground. The same actor as the last in the 
role of Kanpei in “Chushingura.” The play is 
referred to in the note on No. 39 and the rdle 
under No. 60. 

Print reproduced, H. E. Field Catalogue, No. 577. 
Subject reproduced, V. 1. Catalogue, Vol. III, No. 
277, and Kurth, Plate 42. 

Size 15% X 10. 


SHARAKU 

Mica ground. Matsumoto Koshiro in the part 
of a “chivalrous defender of the down-trodden.” 
He holds a short tobacco pipe in his hand. 


47 


66 


67 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


Subject reproduced, V. 1. Catalogue, Vol. II], No. 
270, and Kurth, Plate 44. 
Size 15 X 10§. 


SHARAKU 

Mica ground. Arashi Ryuzo. 

Print reproduced, Rouart Catalogue No. 308. 
Subject reproduced, V. I. Catalogue, Vol. III, 
No. 271, and Kurth, Plate 35. 

Size 145 X OF. 


SHARAKU 
Mica ground. Iwai Hanshiro as Oishi, wife of 
Yuranosuke, hero of ‘“‘Chushingura.”’ For other 
portraits of this actor see Numbers 40, 50, 55. 
The play is referred to under Numbers 39, 60, 
and elsewhere. Yuranosuke is really the hero of 
the piece, for the action concerns itself chiefly 
with the efforts of forty-seven loyal retainers, 
seconded by their wives, to avenge the death of 
their lord on the villain, Moronao; and Yurano- 
suke, besides being the chief retainer, is the brain 
of the devoted band. The graves of these forty- 
seven men are visited annually by thousands, 
for they really lived, and in their deaths as in 
their lives left to posterity an example of that 
unswerving, utterly self-sacrificing loyalty which 
of all virtues is that most honored by the Jap- 
anese. 
Subject reproduced, V. I. Catalogue, Vol. III, No. 
269, and Kurth, Plate 51. 
Size 143 x of. 

48 


68 


69 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


SHARAKU 

Mica ground. Kosagawa Tsuneyo as the wife of 
one of the Ronin in “‘Chushingura”’ (see notes on 
Nos. 39, 67, etc., for this play). A ronin is a 
masterless samurai or fighting man. The re- 
tainers in this play became ronin through the 
death of their lord and the confiscation of his 
property. 

Subject reproduced, V. 1. Catalogue, Vol. III, No. 
282, and Kurth, Plate 52. 

Size 15 X 103. 


SHARAKU 

Mica ground. Bust portrait of an unidentified 
round faced actor with no visible mon, or crest. 
He is leaning forward with outstretched right hand 
and is “‘made up” in red around his eyes and 
nose. The horizontal stripes of his kimono are 
red and white on his right side and green and 
white on his left. He faces toward the left. 
Print reproduced, Kinbei Murata Catalogue of 
October, 1913, No. 106. 

No other impression of this subject has been re- 
produced or recorded and the print exhibited may 
be the only one that has survived. An interest- 
ing comparison may be made with the print by 
Shunyei which is reproduced in color as plate 78 
of the unfinished work by Barboutau (1914). 
Size 154 X 10. 


49 


CATALOGUE. THE GROLIER CLUB 


70 SHARAKU 


7 


Mica ground. Ichikawa Komazo. 

Print reproduced, Jacquin Catalogue (Delmonico- 
Walpole Sale of January, 1921.) No. 35. 

Subject reproduced, V. I. Catalogue, Vol. III, No. 


_ 274, and Kurth, Plate 30. 


— 


Size 143 Xx Of. 


SHARAKU 

Mica ground. In this subject, which is con- 
sidered by many the finest work by Sharaku and 
the most powerful of Japanese prints, the 5th 
Danjuro is again depicted (compare numbers 
46, 47, 53, 56 and 59), this time as Moronao, the 
crafty, cowardly and lecherous villain of the play 
described in the note on Number 39, and else- 
where. An inscription on the face of the print 
gives the date of the performance, October, 1794. 
Subject reproduced, V. I. Catalogue, Vol. III, 
No. 264, and Kurth, Plate 38. 

Size 144 X 10. 


KORIUSAI (worked Ca. 1768-1786) 


Koriusai’s finest work, except for a few very dis- 


tinguished “pillar” prints, is in his birds and flowers. 
Occasionally, as in the print now exhibited, he did a 
really fine thing in the ordinary 15 x 10 inch form, but 
most of the work of his maturity is rather coarse and 
garish. His early prints are strongly under the in- 
fluence of Harunobu, and most of them are of the 
small size made popular by that master, but much 


50 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


less used in the period upon which we are now about 
toenter. He is important enough to deserve a place 
in any exhibition, but in the limited space available 
it seemed best to show only one carefully chosen ex- 
ample. 


72 KORIUSAI 
The Courtesan Nishikigi followed by her atten- 
dants. From a series of fashion plates for the 
dem1-monde. 
Signed by Koriusai and published by Eijudo. 
Seal Koshodo. Date about 1776. 
Size 15% X 10%. 


SHIGEMASA (1739-1820) 


Kitao Shigemasa, a pupil of the “Primitive” Shi- 
genaga, was an accomplished artist of thirty-one 
when Harunobu died; but he survived until within 
five years of the death of Toyokuni, the final great 
artist of the figure prints, and when he himself 
looked for the last time on the world he had de- 
picted, Hokusai had been drawing that world for 
more than twenty years and Hiroshige was finishing 
his student work. Shigemasa’s early prints were 
done in the three-color period, later he was influ- 
enced strongly by Harunobu and other masters of 
polychrome, and worked in many styles, bringing, 
however, to each his own peculiar distinction of treat- 
ment. Early prints by Shigemasa are signed, but 
toward the middle of his career he is said to have re- 
marked that, as no one else could draw as well as he, 


51 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


there was no necessity of affixing his signature. The 
work of his maturity is exceedingly rare, either be- 
cause he did little of it, or because his prints were pub- 
lished in unusually small editions. 


73 SHIGEMASA 
A geisha going to a party followed by her maid 
who carries a samisen (Japanese banjo) in a box. 
This style of Shigemasa’s is peculiarly character- 
istic. It has a plastic quality of modeling, par- 
ticularly in some of the folds of the drapery, that 
suggests sculpture in wood or clay. 
Subject reproduced, British Museum Catalogue 
(Binyon) Page 68. 
Probable date about 1780. 
Size 155 X 105. 


74 SHIGEMASA 
Two young women in thin summer kimono; one 
is seated beside a lantern on a bamboo bench, 
the other stands holding a fan. 
A lovely print by Shigemasa ina style that makes 
it difficult to distinguish from the finest work of 
his pupil, Kitao Masanobu. 
Date about 1790. 
Size 14% x o#. 


KIYONAGA (1752-1814) 


Kiyonaga is considered by many the greatest of 
the artists who designed the Japanese figure prints. 
In power of composition, power of line, he is superb, 
and his people are stately, large-limbed, nobly-pro- 


52 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


portioned, gracious. Compare any print by him 
with a print by Harunobu and notice the gain and 
loss. It is a grown-up world that is depicted here, 
more real, perhaps, than the other; less charming 
and more impressive. Of the impressiveness of 
Kiyonaga there can be no question; he was a mas- 
ter of his art. One admires him more than Har- 
unobu—and loves him less. 

All of the prints by Kiyonaga that have been select- 
ed for exhibition are signed by him, and all that 
have publishers’ marks were published by Eijudo. 
They were issued—in all probability—between 1780 
and 1790; but there is no way of dating them as 
accurately as actor prints, when the records of par- 
ticular performances have survived. Kiyonaga also 
did an important series of scenes from the theatre— 
large sheets, frequently with six figures each. 


75 KIYONAGA 
The actor Ichikawa YaozO in his bedroom. Heis 
listening to the words of a companion who has 
not been identified with certainty, but may have 
been his wife. Is it the duty of a cataloguer to 
find out? 
This print is from a series, as fine as it 1s rare, of 
actors off the stage. 
Size 112 Xx 54. 


76 KIYONAGA 
The Iris Garden. This is the left-hand sheet of 
a diptych afterwards re-engraved. 
Print reproduced, Jacquin Catalogue, No. 62. 


53 


77 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


An impression of the second state, with the de- 
sign re-drawn, is reproduced in color as Plate 12 
of Fenollosa’s “An Outline of the History of 
Ukio-ye.”’ 

Size 144 X Q3. 


KIYONAGA 

The left hand sheet of a diptych. A tall woman 
in black and rose standing - beside a barred 
window, through which a snow landscape is seen. 
In the foreground are a man about to write and a 
child fanning a brazier. Another child behind. 


‘Size 152 x 10. 


78 KIYONAGA 


The Serenade. This is the left-hand, and by far 
the finest, sheet of a triptych representing a scene 
from one of the mediaeval romances that are to 
the Japanese what the ‘“‘ Morte d’Arthur”’ is, or 
might be, to us. In Japan everyone recognizes 
an episode from these stories as quickly as the 
ancient Greeks would have recognized an episode 
out of Homer; they are the common property of 
all. A comparison between the Japanese ro- 
mances and let us say, the “‘ Morte d’Arthur”’ or 
‘““Amadis of Gaul”’ is interesting. There is just. 
as much fighting in the one as in the other, the 
heroes perform deeds of equally amazing prow- 
ess; but in the Japanese stories the women are 
more heroic, more capable; they are not, as the 
adoration of the Virgin Mary made them with 
us, white and aloof, to be protected and died for. 


54 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


In Japan, as in Greece, the bonds of chivalry 
were between men; and the women take, when 
necessity arises, a very active part in affairs, are 
helpmates in the fullest meaning of the word. 

In those eras of Japanese history when the influ- 
ence of China was not dominant the position of 
women, especially in the court circles, was exalted, 
and their education was quite equal to that of 
the men. The first and greatest of Japanese 
novelists, for example, was a woman, and one of 
the most moving episodes in all romance is the 
dance of Shizuka before Yoritomo—the beautiful 
young girl, captive and broken-hearted, before 
the cruel brother of the man she loved. 

In the print exhibited Yoritomo’s young brother, 
Prince Yoshitsune, the most popular among the 
noble heroes of Japan, is seen in an earlier part 
of his career, playing a serenade outside a palace, 
the mistress of which has sent her maid to iden- 
tify the musician. It was an evening of “peril- 
ous moonlight” and the end of the story that 
is scarcely more than an episode in the life of 
Yoshitsune, was, for the beautiful young inmate 
of the palace, death. 

This print, the garden background of which is in 
green as it should be, not yellow, is reproduced as 
No. 291 in the Catalogue of the Shotaro Sato 
Sale, New York, 1916. Impressions of the whole 
triptych in the first state are reproduced in the 
Hayashi Catalogue, p. 216; and elsewhere. A 
reissue of the print was made from recut blocks 
with the moon left out, and other changes, and 


55 


79 


80 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


this second state of the sheet exhibited may best 
be compared with the first in the reproduction of 
the V. I. Catalogue, Vol. III, No. 109. 

Size 152 X 10%. 


KIYONAGA 

Two ladies out for a walk accompanied by a maid 
servant and a young samurai. It is pleasant to 
find that some of Kiyonaga’s statuesque beauties 
are of what might be called good society. Ladies 
dressed, of course, in a much less ostentatious 
manner than the courtesans; the obis are not 
tied in front and the showy hair pins are not 
worn. From a series, perhaps of fashion plates, 
called: ‘‘Brocades of the Eastern Capital.” 
The Eastern Capital was Yedo, now Tokio, as 
distinguished from Kioto. The Shoguns who 
had usurped the power—like the Mayors of the 
Palace of early France—kept their state in Yedo; 
the Emperors had their quieter court at Kioto. 
Print reproduced in color: Arthur Morrison, 
Catalogue of Exhibition of The Fine Art Soci- 
ety, London 1910, No. 104. 

Size 154 X 10%. 


KIYONAGA 

The courtesan Wakakusa of Chojiya followed by 
her attendants. 

A marvel of printing, perfectly preserved. This 
is a sheet from a set illustrating spring fashions 
of the demi-monde, in which Kiyonaga and Kori- 
usal appear to have collaborated. See No. 72. 


56 


8 


— 


82 


33 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


Subject reproduced, No. 205, Sotheby Catalogue 
of May 31, 1921: The First Portion of the Col- 
lection of T. Thacher Clarke. 

Size 15 X 10%. 


KIYONAGA 

A young man with two geisha; the one at the left 
stands holding a round fan, the one at the right 
is seated with a samisen, or Japanese banjo, 
across her lap. 

Notice the perfect placing of the black pouch in 
the foreground, without which the print would 
lose half its beauty. It is from a Series showing 
the ‘Real Beauties of the Gay Quarters.” 
Subject reproduced, Van Caneghem Catalogue, 
No. 63, and Sotheby Catalogue of November 27, 
1913: The Collection of an American Artist 
Residing in Europe, No. 78. 

Size 143 x 103. 


KIYONAGA 

The actor Matsumoto Koshiro having tea with 
two geisha. 

Size 15} X 10%. 


KIYONAGA 

The Salt Gatherers. Two peasant girls at the 
edge of the sea, carrying the buckets in which 
they gather salt-water. Again in this print there 
is a reference to an old romance, for the two girls 
represent Matsukaze and Murasame, who passed 


57 


84 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


into legend and became the subject of a No drama 
because of their relations with a noble who had 
been banished from court to exile on the sea 
coast of Suma. Once more, as in the subject of 
Number 78, the episode was but an episode for 
the lover, but, for the girl, the beginning and 
end of happiness, the warrant of immortality. 
Kiyonaga has done the same scene again in a 
pillar print. This print is from the same Series 
as No. 79. 

The subject has been reproduced in many places, 
among which it is best to choose the reproduction 
in color of the V. I. Catalogue, Vol. III, No. 63, in 
spite of the fact that this was made from an im- 
pression that had been trimmed, and had faded 
to a lovely harmony of quiet tones, whereas the 
one exhibited here is in perfect condition. 

Size 152 x 10%. 


KIYONAGA | 

A court lady of the long ago beside a stream. 
Kiyonaga did a number of prints of this type 
representing the old court costumes with their 
beautifully flowing lines; most of these have two 
figures each, the one exhibited with its stately 
single figure is the finest that the compiler has 
seen. 

Print reproduced as frontispiece to Catalogue of 
‘‘A Small Private Collection,”’ Walpole Galleries, 
New York, June 14, 1920. 

Subject reproduced, Ficke Catalogue, No. 209. 
Size 15 X 10. 


58 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


85 KIYONAGA 
Diptych. A group of people visiting a shrine in 
winter. The entrance to each Shinto shrine is 
marked by that beautifully decorative erection 
known as a Jorii which consists of two uprights 
surmounted by a cross piece, usually curved, and 
is constructed of gray stone, wood or red lacquer. 
The origin and significance of the Torii is some- 
what in doubt, but the form goes back to imme- 
morial antiquity. 
The figure of the man in black is particularly fine, 
the dark robes being set off against the snow. 
The left-hand sheet is reproduced in color in the 
Catalogue of the Exhibition held by the Japan 
Society of New York 1911, No. 131; the right- 
hand sheet is reproduced in the Van Caneghem 
Catalogue, No. 45. 
Size 15% X 20. 


86 KIYONAGA 
Triptych. Women landing from a pleasure boat. 
The limited amount of space available permitted 
the exhibition of but two triptychs. This one, 
however, could not be omitted. It is a famous 
impression of a famous print. 
Subject reproduced, V. I. Catalogue, Vol. III, 
No. 110. 
Size 15 X 30. 


59 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


SHUNCHO (worked Ca. 1780-1795) 


Shuncho’s work was contemporary with the best 
of Kiyonaga’s. It is somewhat less masculine, less- 
statuesque than that of his great rival; the figures 
are apt to have a softer, more gently feminine grace. 
Kiyonaga was the greater of the two, but Shuncho 
has a quality all his own, that gives him high place 
among the artists who worked in the closing decades 
of the 18th Century. 


87 SHUNCHO 
Triptych. A group of women of pleasure, whose 
names and addresses are given, in an iris garden. 
A lovely color scheme of quiet tones that became 
the vogue about 1790 and was much used by 
Shuncho, Shunman and Yeishi. 
It is said that in Japan demons cannot change 
easily the direction in which they are going, a fact 
that makes bridges of the kind shown in the print 
exceedingly useful; for if the devil is after you 
and you turn the corner abruptly he is likely to 
fall off into the water and be drowned. 
This triptych, unmounted at the time, was in the 
famous fire at Nagoya, in which so many fine 
prints were destroyed. 
Subject reproduced, Sotheby Catalogue of April 
17, 1918. (A Parisian Collector), No. 72. 
Signed by Shuncho and published by Izumiya. 
Sizé-15 X 30. 

60 


88 


89 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


SHUNCHO 

A youth walking with a woman in black and two 
attendants. 

Print reproduced, Blanchard Catalogue, No. 27. 
Signed by Shuncho and published by Eijudo. 
Size 15% X 10. 


SHUNCHO 

Mica ground. Bust portrait of a young girl 
holding a round, red fan. From a series of 
beautiful women compared to flowers. The iris 
is shown in a circle above. An exquisite piece of 
color and design; one of the loveliest prints in the 
exhibition. 

Signed by Shuncho and published by Tsuruya. 
S1ZE15.X On. 


SHUNMAN (1757-1820) 


Shunman designed many fine surimono, or prints 


for special occasions, which were made with a some- 
what different technique from those now exhibited. 
His work of the more usual variety is exceedingly 
rare and is noted for its delicacy of treatment and 
color. 


90 SHUNMAN 


Two adjoining sheets, mounted as a diptych, of 
Shunman’s best known composition—a six sheet 
set illustrating the six rivers named Tama of 
Japan. These six rivers of the same name are 
frequently illustrated or allegorized. Many po- 
ems were written about them, one being noted 


61 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


for the beauty of the flowers that grew on its 
banks, another for the sweetness of its water, 
and so forth. 

The subjects are reproduced with the sheet that 
comes next on the left in Succo’s ‘““Toyokuni,” Vol. 
I, Plate 13. The one still farther to the left is 
shown in the V. I. Catalogue, Vol. V, No. 127. 
Signed by Shunman and published by Fushi-zen 
about 1790. 

Size, right-hand sheet, 148 x 98. 

Size, left-hand sheet, 15 x 98. 


UTAMARO (1753-1806) 


After Harunobu, Sharaku, Kiyonaga, and ranked 
by the French as at least the equal of any of them, 
comes Utamaro—the fourth great artist of the “ Bro- 
cade Pictures”; the lover of women, the painter, 
of the Fleurs du Mal. Unquestionably a great ar- 
tist, he gave his art, he gave his life to the “Flowers 
of Yedo,” as the courtesans in their gorgeous robes 
had come to be called; and as his power worked to- 
ward its premature decline he drew them with ever 
increasing exaggeration of figure and of pose, more 
and more like blooms of the jungle and morass, 
never such blossoms as filled the spring-time orchards 
of Harunobu or climb the wind-swept hillsides of 
Japan. Utamaro’s earlier work is in the manner of 
Kiyonaga and Shuncho, with figures of large propor- 
tions; the finest of his prints come in the middle 
period and toward the close of his career the exag- 
geration and mannerisms become pronounced. 


62 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


91 UTAMARO 
Two geisha preparing for a fancy-dress proces- 
sion. - A maid is helping one on with her outer 
robe while the other is applying rouge (benz) to 
her face before a mirror. From the so-called 
“Niwaka” series which was published before 
1780. This is a fine impression of a famous sub- 
ject and has the color perfectly preserved. It is 
exhibited, not so much to illustrate the very early, 
imitative manner of Utamaro, as to show the 
final technical perfection attained in the art of 
color-printing from wood-blocks. Utamaro was 
very fond of technical difficulties, tours de force 
of engraving and printing. In the printing of 
this sheet a large number of color-blocks were 
used and the perfection of the engraving as well 
as that of the printing is extraordinary. Notice 
the translucent scarf thrown over the painted 
screen, the edge of the material against the white 
neck of the standing geisha and the reflected hair 
of the other one. The print is too crowded to be 
one of Utamaro’s artistic triumphs, but the un- 
known cutter of the blocks and the printer de- 
serve to have their work remembered. 
Subject reproduced, from a trimmed, soiled and 
dull-colored copy, V. I. Catalogue, Vol. IV, No. 
18. The impression exhibited was No. 220 in the 
Appleton Sale at Sotheby’s in 1g1o. 
Signed Utamaro. 
Size 53x, 104: 


63 


Q2 


93 


04 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


UTAMARO 

Bust portrait of Komurasaki of Tameya. Com- 
pare this print with Number 91 and note the 
elongation of the face—an indication that it was 
made toward the close of Utamaro’s career, 
though probably before 1800. 

Subject reproduced, Haviland Catalogue, Part I, 
No: 3 

Signed by Utamaro and published by Yamaguchi. 
Size 154 x 104. 


UTAMARO 

Blowing up the Fire. The right hand and finer 
sheet of the “Kitchen” diptych. First state. 
The print was reissued later with a number of 
important changes, perhaps necessitated by the 
afterthought of a second sheet to go with it in a 
diptych. 

Subject reproduced in the later form, V. I. 
Catalogue, Vol. IV, No. 90 and Hayashi Cata- 
logue, p. 188. The first state, with the publisher’s 
mark on the right hand, or only, sheet does not 
appear to have been reproduced. © 

Signed Utamaro and published by Uyemura. 
Size 15 X10. 

It is difficult to date accurately prints by Uta- 
maro but this one and those that follow may be 
classed roughly as of the middle period. 


UTAMARO 

A geisha and her maid in a storm, carrying an 
umbrella, the box containing her samisen, and a 
lantern, the rays of which light the scene. 


64 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


Print reproduced; Kinbei Murata Catalogue of 
October 1913, No. 164. 

Subject reproduced, Catalogue of Exhibition held 
by Fine Art Society of London, 1910, No. 128. 
Signed by Utamaro and published by Moriji. 
Size 15 x 8. 


UTAMARO 

Half-length figures of two women, each of whom 
holds a round fan. 

A proof without letters; for in other printings of 
this subject, as in the one reproduced by Mr. 
Ficke—‘‘Chats on Japanese Prints” Plate 39— 
the upper right hand corner contains a small 
landscape and a cartouche which gives a series 
title—‘‘ Beautiful Women Compared with the 53 
Stations of the Tokaido Road.” An explanation 
of this comparison could be given, but it would be 
tedious to read and tedious to write, for the Jap- 
anese inherited or adopted from their Chinese 
neighbors the habit of harping on certain sub- 
jects, the result being far-fetched comparisons, 
tedious to us. 

This print must have been drawn shortly before 
the middle period of Utamaro’s work had ended. 
Signed Utamaro. 

Size 152 X 103. 


9 


wn 


96 UTAMARO 
Consolation. A young woman being comforted 
by her maid. This is said to be the right hand 
sheet of a diptych of which the other part shows 


65 


9 


9 


7 


OO 


CATALOGUE. THE GROLIER CLUB 


the girl’s lover going off with a rival. The com- 
piler cannot recall having seen the left hand sheet. 
A particularly beautiful piece of color and print- 
ing. 

Subject reproduced, Haviland Catalogue, Part I, 
No. 307. 

Signed Utamaro. Date about 1790. 

BIZze'T5 % 10; 


UTAMARO 

An Elopement. Frequently miscalled ‘A Night 
Excursion.” This is one of Utamaro’s finest 
designs. It represents the elopement of Jihei, a 
merchant, with the geisha Koharu, a story the 
details of which are unknown to the writer of 
this catalogue. 

Subject reproduced in color, V. b: Chtaliagde: Vol. 
IV, No. 140. 

Signed Utamaro. 

Size 15% X 93. 


UTAMARO 

Yellow ground. A seated girl looking down at 
her beautiful white robe which is printed without 
the key-block black outline, the folds being in- 
dicated by gauffrage. Her face is outlined in 
pink. Another proof without letters; the usual 
impressions bear in the upper left hand corner a 
self-glorifying advertisement of Utamaro and 
all his works. Print reproduced, Catalogue of 
Schraubstadter Collection, No. 788. The usual 
state is reproduced, V. 1. Catalogue, Vol. IV, No. 


66 


G9 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


94 and Kurth: ‘‘Utamaro,” Plate 31. The print 
is signed but bears no publisher’s mark. 
Size 15 x 92. 


UTAMARO 

Mica ground. Bust portrait of three famous 
beauties of the day. The title has been written 
in, perhaps by some contemporary. This may 
be another proof before letters. 

The V. 1. Catalogue, Vol. IV, No. 72, reproduces 
a print like the one exhibited, except for the car- 
touche in the corner and the names of the girls 
which must have been put in later and are lacking 
here. 

Signed by Utamaro and published by Tsutaya. 
Size 15% X 10%. 


100 UTAMARO 


Mica ground. Half-length portrait of a young 
woman of good society holding an open fan and 
open umbrella, under which in cartouches are 
the title of the series: ‘“Ten young women 
judged by a study of their faces’’; and the cur- 
ious signature “‘Utamaro the Physiognomist, 
after mature consideration.” 

The print is in as perfect condition as though it 
had just come from the printer. 

Print reproduced, Kinbei Murata Catalogue of 
September, 1917; and ‘‘Album of Old Prints 
reproduced from the Collection of Ken-ichi 
Kawaura,” No. 186. 


67 


10 


— 


102 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


Subject reproduced, V. I. Catalogue, Vol. IV, 
No. 32. 

Publisher Tsutaya. 

Size 15 X 104. 


UTAMARO 

Mica ground. Half length portrait of the 
courtesan Hanaogi, whose address is given, 
holding a writing brush in one hand and a 
sheet of paper in the other. Above, in a second 
cartouche, is an erotic poem. 

The 001, or sash, is printed in dull yellow, not in 
the green of some copies. 

Print reproduced, Kinbei Murata Catalogue of 
October, 1913, No. 123. 

Subject reproduced, V. I. Catalogue, Vol. IV, 
No. 62. 

Signed by Utamaro and published by Tsutaya. 
Size 14% x of. 


UTAMARO 

Mica ground. The beautiful tea-house waitress 
Naniwaya Okita, carrying a bowl of tea on a 
black lacquer stand. The poem above is signed 
Katsura Biju, and has a heading—‘‘ Written 
while resting in Naniwa’s tea-house.” The text 
is a charming compliment to the lovely Naniwa, 
but the Japanese are as fond of unseasonable 
puns as the Dying Duke in “Richard IJ,” and the 
number of them in this brief lyric would neces- 
sitate a commentary to explain a translation. 


68 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


Subject reproduced, V. I. Catalogue, Vol. IV, 
No. 67. 

Signed by Utamaro and published by Tsutaya. 
Size 14% X gf. 


CHOKI (worked Ca. 1789-1797) 


Very little is known of this artist who appears to 
have worked only for a few brief years, but has left 
prints of surpassing grace—as beautiful as they are 
rare. Choki’s color schemes are particularly dis- 
tinctive; and his finest prints, such as the two-figure 
one exhibited, are filled with romance. 


103 CHOKI 
Mica ground. Half-length portrait of Tsukasa 
Dayu, a lady of pleasure of Osaka. 
Print reproduced, Haviland Catalogue Part I, 
No. 336. 
Signed by Choki and published by Tsutaya. 
Size 142 X 10. 


104 CHOKI 
Mica ground. Two young women in moon- 
light beside a stream. One is lighting her pipe. 
Print described, Haviland Catalogue, Part I, 


No. 337. 
Subject reproduced, V. I. Catalogue, Vol. V, 


No. 112. 
Signed by Choki and published by Tsutaya. 


Size 15 x 10 
69 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


YEISHI (1756 (?) -1829) 


Yeishi, who was one of the few print designers of 
samurai rank, gave up making prints about 1799 
and devoted the remaining thirty years of his life to 
the more respected occupation of painting. He was 
fond of portraying the ladies of the upper classes and 
his long slim figures—drawn with exaggeration and 
mannerism as some are—are distinctive in their 
aristocratic grace; an effect which is helped by the 
quiet refinement of his favorite color scheme—black, 
gray, green, purple, yellow, in which the predom- . 
inant blacks and grays are set off by the touches 
of brighter color. His earliest prints date from about 
1788, so that the period of their production covers 
only eleven years. There is a delicacy of willowy 
loveliness about his work that makes it peculiarly 
prized. . 


105 YEISHI . 
The popular beauty Karakoto of Choji-ya walk- 
ing with her attendants under wistaria blossoms. 
This is a sheet from a triptych. Signed by 
Yeishi and published by Izumtya. 
Size 15% X 10%. 


106 YEISHI 
A lady, her maid and a child on a balcony with 
yellow railings. Above them the lattice screen 
is rolled up. At their feet is an empty bird 


hy 


107 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


cage and all are looking out of the picture to the 
right as though the bird had just been released. 
Behind is a brook in which ducks are swimming 
and, back of that, other buildings of a palace, or, 
temple enclosure. Probably the left hand sheet 
of a lost triptych. 

Signed Yeishi. 

Size. 15 X 10. 


YEISHI 

Anepisode in the life of Komachi. Snow Scene. 
Komachi, a famous ninth century poetess of 
great talent and unusual beauty, passed her 
youth in luxury and splendor, gratifying each 
extravagant fancy. ‘‘But age, apace, comes at 
last to all,’ and to her it came more quickly 
than to most, bringing with it poverty, squalor 
and hunger. The strange reversal of Koma- 
chi’s fortune from such heights of splendor to 
such depths of want, made her life a favorite 
subject for the artist and the moralist. Seven 
episodes in her career usually are depicted in a 
sort of analogue, no attempt being made to 
portray the costumes of the by-gone age, but 
the story being applied to some scornful con- 
temporary beauty. Yeishi’s Komachi Series is 
the best known and probably the finest of the 
printed ones, and two sheets of it are shown here. 
Print reproduced, Haviland Catalogue, Part I, 
No. 318. 

Signed Yeishi and published by Izumtya. 

Size 15 x 10. 


7i 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


108 YEISHI 


109 


The fifth episode in Komachi’s Life. ‘“‘ Praying 
for Rain.” From the same series as the pre- 
ceding number, and with the same signature 
and publisher’s mark. This must be a very 
early impression from the blocks and is a 
particularly fine piece of engraving and print- 
ing. 

Subject reproduced, Haviland Catalogue, Part 
[; No, 310; 

Size 154 X 10%. 


YEISHI 

An episode from that chapter of the ‘Genji: 
Monogatari,” or tales of Genji; which deals with 
the adventures of the Amorous Prince during 
his exile at Suma. | 

Yeishi designed a number of fine triptychs de- 
picting the famous Prince Genji, of whom more 
anon. 

The print exhibited is thought to be a sheet 
from one of these triptychs, the rest of which has 
not been found; and, if this be the case, it prob- 
bably was the middle sheet—an inference to be 
drawn from the composition and the placing of the 
signature. The print, which is complete enough 
in itself, is one of Yeishi’s best known and loveli- 
est designs—the figure of the young lady in 
black having that inimitable refinement and 
charm which are characteristics of his finest 
work. 


72 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


Prince Genji is the hero of the first and best of 
Japanese novels, a book that was written in the 
tenth century by Murasaki Shikibu, a court- 
lady whose diary has recently been published 
in English and shows, as does her novel, the 
astonishing degree of culture, refinement and 
aesthetic appreciation which had been attained 
by the Japanese at that early date. The Prince 
himself, a natural son of the Emperor, and a 
gentleman as talented as he was charming, won 
the hearts of most men and—with the notable 
exception of his step-mother—of all women; 
but notwithstanding his own impressionable 
nature he was difficult to win. There was, for 
example, one young lady for whose education 
and talents he had the highest admiration but 
for whom his friendship could not ripen into 
love because, forsooth, her nose turned red 
whenever the weather grew chilly. The “ele- 
gant’’ Genji was a very fastidious person in 
spite of his propensity for ‘‘Bunberrying.”’ 
An excellent English translation of the first 
seventeen chapters of the novel, was published 
years ago, and gives a fascinating picture of the 
old court life with its rigid decorum and over- 
developed zstheticism. 

The subject of the print exhibited has been re- 
produced several times; the best of these repro- 
ductions being that of the Appleton Catalogue 
(London 1910) Plate 23, though another, more 
easily accessible, is in Ficke’s ‘‘Chats on Japan- 
ese Prints” Plate 37. Mr. Ficke’s impression 


73 


110 


1] 


— 


CATALOGUE! THE GROLIER CLUB 


is entirely in black and gray without the purple 
of the one exhibited. 

Signed Yeishi. 

Size 15+ x 10%. 


YEISHI 

The Geisha Itsutomi standing; her samisen is 
at her feet, the plectrum in her hand. From a 
series of portraits of Geisha. This tall, slender 
figure shows the mannerism into which Yeishi’s 
style developed, but is an exquisite thing that 
could not have been done by anyone but Yeishi. 
The print looks as though it might once have had 
a silver background, though neither of the other 
impressions known to the writer—that in the 
Louvre and that reproduced in the V. I. Cata- 
logue, Vol. V, No. 25, shows any more trace of 
silver than does the print exhibited. 

Signed by the artist and published by Iwatoya. 
Siz@145 X Ot: 


YEISHI 

Silver ground. The courtesan Takigawa of 
Ogiya. From a Series of “‘Beauties of the Gay 
Quarters” (Yoshiwara). The silver ground 
prints of this series are the finest as well as the 
rarest of all Yeishis; perhaps there is nothing 
more lovely in the whole range of the art. 
Subject reproduced in color, V.I. Catalogue, Vol. 
V, No. 26. A comparison will show that the 
print exhibited here is in much better condition, 
the delicate design in the white part of the 


74 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


kimono having faded from the Paris impression. 
Signed Yeishi Kigwa (designed for fun), and 
published by Iwatoya. 

Size 14% X 10. 


YEISHIN 


Nothing has been ascertained regarding Yeishin 
who is assumed to have been a pupil of Yeishi. His 
few known works are excessively rare. 


112 -YEISHIN 
Silver ground. Half length portrait of a young 
noble with a falcon on his wrist. His outer 
kimono is decorated with a design of eggplants 
and, where his family mon, or crest, should be 
is Fuji in white reserve, thus uniting the three 
fortunate omens of Japanese superstition—the 
eggplant, the sacred mountain and the falcon. 
It is worthy of notice that while there are three 
reproductions of this subject, V. I. Catalogue, 
Vol. V, No. 62, Hayashi Catalogue, p. 228, where 
the numbers and names are transposed through 
a printer’s error, and Sotheby Sale of June 5, 
1914, No. 63; all of these lack the silver ground, 
though that of the print exhibited certainly is 
old.. The slight pink flush about the temple 
was part of the original printing but was printed 
very lightly and has almost faded out with time. 
Signed Choyensai Yeishin. 
Date about 1790. 
Size 15 x 10. 


75 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


GOKIO 


Not much more is known of Gokio than of Yei- 
shin except that his work is not quite as rare and 
that he signed a number of prints “Yeishi’s pupil 
Gokio.” He is thought to have died very young. 


113 GOKIO 
The Courtesan Makinoya of Matsukaneya, with 
her attendants, passing in front of one of the 
Yoshiwara houses with its green blinds. The 
color scheme of predominant gray with black, 
green, lavendar and yellow is characteristic of 
Yeishi; but the print, though unsigned, is at- 
tributed with some confidence to Gokio whose 
signed work it resembles even more than it does 
that of his teacher. 
Subject reproduced, Basil Stewart: ‘Subjects 
Portrayed in Japanese Color Prints, Plate 2, 
No. 2. 
Date about 1790, probably just after Gokio 
ceased to sign as a pupil; or, it may be part of a 
triptych one sheet of which was signed. 
Size 154 X 103. 


YEIRI 


Little or nothing is known about Yeiri. His prints 
are as rare as those of Yeishin, with whom and with 
Gokio it is probable that he studied under Yeishi; 
but in any case he is not to be confounded with 
Rekisentai Yeiri, or the so-called Yeiri 2nd, both 


76 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


of whom were artists of far less power than he. 
The fame of our Yeiri rests chiefly on the two or 
three astonishing portraits by him that have survived, 
one of these is exhibited. 


ha YER) 
Mica ground over black. Portrait of the novel- 


ist Santo Kyodden, who in his earlier years was 
the painter and print designer Kitao Masanobu 
(see note on Number 74), and who in his youth 
made the pictures for a volume that is consid- 
ered one of the handsomest illustrated books of 
any nation. From a series depicting the celeb- 
rities of the various districts of Yedo. An- 
other of the set, and almost the only other that 
has survived, is reproduced in color, V. I. 
Catalogue, Vol. V, No. 59. It is unfortunate 
that no reference can be given to any reproduc- 
tion of the subject exhibited. 

Signed Yeiri. Probable date about 1794. 
Size 152 x 104. 


KUNIMASA (1773-1810) 


Kunimasa appears to have designed prints only 
for about eight years (1795-1803). He is noted for 
his large heads of actors and was a pupil of Toyo- 
kuni, the last great artist of the figure prints, whose 
work will close the present exhibition. 


115 KUNIMASA 
The Laughing Girl. Bust portrait of the actor 
Matsumoto Yonesaburo, as a woman. 


77 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


Subject reproduced, ‘Selected Actor Prints,” 
No. 263. 

Signed Kunimasa and published by Uyemura 
about 1796. 

Size 145 X 92. 


TORIN 


The little that is known or surmised of Torin, as 
a designer of prints, may be stated briefly. He 
represented the third generation of a family of paint- 
ers called Tsutsumi, who were followers of the school 
of. Korin, and was considerably more distinguished 
than his predecessors. He is known chiefly as a 
painter of pictures for temples and is said to have 
taught Hokusai. There are a few Surimono signed 
Torin, and it is recorded that one sheet of an illus- 
trated book published in 1798 bears his signature. 
The Hayashi Catalogue lists one print by him, and 
the compiler knows of no other, except the one ex- 
hibited. 


116 TORIN 

Bust portrait of Ogino Isaburo as Yuranosuke, 
the hero of Chushingura (see Numbers 39, 67 
and 120), in gray and black against a black 
ground. The outlines and details of the head 
are printed without key-block and are indicated 
by gauffrage. 

This print was No. 129 in the London Loan 
Exhibition of 1915 and is illustrated in Plate 
XXXV of the Joly and Tomita Catalogue. 


78 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


The same subject, and from the same blocks, is 
reproduced in the second Manzi Catalogue, No. 
380, but that impression is signed “Toyokuni,” 
lacks the black ground, and was published by 
Marusei, with the name of the actor and the réle 
given in cartouches. Probably the original, by 
the obscure painter Torin, did not sell and the 
print was re-issued with the substituted signa- 
ture of the immensely popular Toyokuni whose 
work it does not resemble. 

Signed Kawa Torin. 

Publishers Tsutaya and Uemura. 

Size 15} xX 103. 


TOYOKUNI (1769-1825) 


Toyokuni Ist, the last great artist of the figure 
prints, survived and hastened the death of the art. 
In his later years, yielding to the enormous demand 
for his work, he produced a great number of designs 
which were mediocre in themselves and were printed, 
because of the lowered standard of public taste and 
the carelessness of the overworked artist, in crude 
colors. After him came the deluge of imitators and 
pupils and adopters of his name, the ocean of whose 
works is supposed by the uninitiated to represent the 
color printing of Japan. Fortunately, at the very 
moment when the last good figure prints were being 
made, the art itself came to a new birth in the land- 
scapes of Hokusai and Hiroshige. 

In his earlier work, which shows a wide range of 
subject, Toyokuni is well able to rank with the best 


72 


CATALOGUE. THE GROLIER® CLUB 


of his contemporaries. He drew many lovely por- 
traits of women and scenes of the passing world; but 
for the purposes of this exhibition, with the limited 
space available, it seemed wiser to represent Toyo- 
kuni more adequately in one phase alone of his work, 
and for this purpose his standing figures of actors 
have been chosen, the selection being made chiefly 
from the best known and finest series—‘“‘ Portraits of 
Actors on the Stage.”’ 


117 TOYOKUNI 
The standing figure of an actor whose green outer 
robe is decorated in yellow with a design of con- 
ventionalized cherry-blossoms—the mon, or 
crest, of Michizane, a statesman and poet of the 
ninth century, who is famous in song and story. 
There were many plays about him. (See note 
on Number 21.) 
Signed Toyokuni and published by Izumiya. 
Size 15 X 10. 


118 TOYOKUNI 
The actor Bando Mitsugoro as a young Samurai, 
stepping forward with right leg bared. 
Signed Toyokuni and published by Izumiya. 
Size 143 X OF. 


The remaining seven prints are from Toyokuni’s 
finest series “Portraits of Actors on the Stage” or 
Yakusha Butai no Sugata-ye. All are signed and 
have the usual publishers’ marks and cartouches 


80 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


bearing the titles. They were published about 
1795. 


119 


120 


TOYOKUNI 

The 3rd Sawamura Sojuro (Kinokuntya), as the 
Daimyo of Sendai. Hecarries a fan anda straw 
shade hat. 

Subject reproduced in color V. |. Catalogue, 
Vol. VI, No. 20. 

Sizé 155 X 10%. 


TOYOKUNI 

Mica ground. The same actor as Yuranosuke. 
(See Numbers 67 and 116.) 

Yuranosuke was accustomed to delude the spies 
of Moronao by pretending intoxication. In 
this print he is said to be depicted with his 
clothes on backward; but, even though all Japan- 
ese actors are more or less double-jointed, and 
sake is a powerful stimulant, it is difficult to 
see how anyone could have gotten his head, feet 
and hand into the relative positions shown. 
There is some mystery about this print. The 
kimono of the actor bears the usual Sojuro mon 
(compare Numbers 57, 58); but the crest on 
the outer robe, which appears to be falling off 
him, is one frequently used to indicate the ronin 
in this play—the “‘Chushingura,” in which so 
many actors have been depicted. 

Subject reproduced, V. I. Catalogue, Vol. VI, 
No. 30. 

Size 148 x oF. 


I21 


122 


123 


124 


CATALOGUE: THE GROLIER CLUB 


TOYOKUNI 

The 3rd Segawa Kikunojo (Hamamuraya) as a 
woman. Compare this print with the next. 
Subject reproduced, No. 4, in the ‘Journal of 
the Ukio-ye Society of Japan,” Vol. II, No. I, 
November, 1922. 

Size 152 X 103. 


TOYOKUNI 

The same actor, apparently in the same part but 
differently posed, with different sweep of the 
draperies and with the black obi, or sash, tied 
behind instead of in front as it was in No. 121. 
Subject reproduced, V. I. Catalogue, Vol. VI, 
No. 37. 

Size 142 x 103. 


TOYOKUNI 

Matsumoto Koshiro as a man of rank. 

Subject reproduced, Jacquin Catalogue, No.653. 
Size 152 X 10%. 


TOYOKUNI 
Mica ground. Bando Mitsugoro drawing his 
sword. 
Print reproduced, Kinbei Murata Catalogue of 
October, 1919, No. 81. 
Subject reproduced, “Journal of the Ukio-ye 
Society of Japan,’’ November, 1922, No. 7. 
Size 142 x 10. 

82 


JAPANESE FIGURE PRINTS 


125 TOYOKUNI 
The 3rd Segawa Kikunojo as a dancer with an 
open fan in her right hand. (See note on Num- 
ber 16.) 
Size 143 X 10. 


THE END 


83 


_ UL AINVIL 
TANNO LA PERS 
FLZIONE MA LA 


ee ce ae 


